


Forbearance

by Bushwah



Category: Original Work
Genre: Abuser/Victim Shipping, Amoric Horror, Begging, Bondage, Coercion, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dehumanization, Domestic Violence, Emotional Manipulation, Fighting Kink, Gaslighting, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Interrogation, Non-Consensual Kink, Non-Consensual Touching, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Other, POV Second Person, Painplay, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Praise Kink, Psychological Horror, Solitary Confinement, Sparring, Stockholm Syndrome, Torture, Touch-Starved, Undertale References, Unspecified Setting, Verbal Humiliation, Victim Blaming, hurt/false comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-07-09 13:11:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19888384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bushwah/pseuds/Bushwah
Summary: "They disable the flight response first."





	1. Chapter 1

They disable the flight response first.

Leaving would be proving you aren't ready for what they have to show you. Leaving would be proving that you're not strong, that you're not mature, that you can't take care of yourself.

Leaving would be giving up. You don't give up. You stay.

This holds through the first round of testing.

* * *

Testing is intense and overwhelming. Some of it is laughable. Some of it is obviously inappropriate. Some of it is obviously _impossible_. Asking incredulous questions earns you no reaction. When you take it seriously, you get criticism, harsh but constructive. The first time you break down and ask for help without mocking the test, you get soft words: no, I'm sorry, you have to do it yourself, but I know you can do it; you're trying so well for me.

This continues until your resolve is flickering like a candle in the wind. "Please, not so much," and they ask really and you say yes, yes, I can't take it, and they stop. They really stop, like the whole world went silent and dark just for you. It's dizzying and wonderful and just a little frightening. They smile and you smile back. "That's enough for now" and you just go limp. You feel your body calling out for rest and you don't fight it. They come in close and guard you as you sink into exhaustion.

Then it's morning. They're gone. You find yourself wondering if it really happened.

That evening, they return.

* * *

Incrementally it settles into place. You have your life during the days, and they have you at night. Testing is, well, it's a lot, and often new stuff comes as a surprise, but they don't go past what you can handle. When you're particularly raw and exhausted, sometimes they hold you, talk to you soothingly. That's when you're most likely to cry. Oh, darling, they say, when you hide your face and they have to turn your head to see the tears; oh, sweetheart, that's so good. You're being so good for me.

Then one night, sometime in the middle between tests, they stop unprompted. It takes you a while to pull yourself together enough to realize something has changed. "I'm sorry," you say.

"Why aren't you fighting back?" they ask.

"I can take it," you say defensively.

"I know you can, sweetheart." Their soft voice sounds disappointed.

You frown, replaying the question. "Do you... want me to?"

They don't answer. What feels like a long time later, the testing starts again.

* * *

Time passes, and you don't seem to be getting over the thing where sometimes you can't handle being tested. It's not that you don't try, but you'll fail to hold still, or complain, or fall out of a stress position. They're gentle about it, so unrelentingly gentle, as they keep going around your weakness, and you know you don't deserve it. The first time you ask them to tie you up they smile brilliant as the sun, and you hold that image tight as the night goes on.

Anger builds up eventually. You confess to them, terrified that they'll misunderstand, that they'll think you're threatening them, and they just sigh fondly and hold you and strike you, every now and again, to remind you to stay alert.

But you feel a change, a charge in the air that wasn't there before, a watchful curiosity that spikes with something that might be interest or even approval when you move. It's one of the only reactions you can reliably get out of them, and you treasure it. Even their approval, however, does not come without pain. The only real cessation of pain is the moments, rare and getting rarer, of their mercy.

* * *

They have to ask you, in the end, to not merely let yourself be tumbled. To fight with them, hesitant at first and then bolder as they urge you on, matador; to lose and lose, staggering in closer to exhaustion. Have them patient patient patient and then when you actually disobey, by holding back, by escaping the paradigm, the sudden sharp strike, dizzy and pain and allconsuming.

"You do not want to try me for real" they say and it somehow gets more, like gravity inverted, intensified; pressure on the inside of your eyes and you look at them and see absolute indifference and you know somehow, suddenly, that this is only a tiny fraction of their strength, still. That this affects them not at all.

You stop fighting, not a calculated act to build up strength but the only possible expression of an overwhelmed sort of awe; and they gather you up off the softness of the ground, coordination perfect and unassailable, and carry you all the way home.


	2. Chapter 2

Wanting intimacy, wanting to be spoken to, wanting to be touched, especially wanting to be touched tenderly, that immense yearning for a human connection, all of it channeled down to a tiny sliver of skin on skin, steadying, ecstatic, but nowhere near enough—

Being stripped in the open air and _praying_ that this means you'll be held but no, no, you fight the restraints just to imagine the cuffs around your wrists are someone's hands, firm and unyielding and _there_ —

And then: trying to express a preference or disobey a command, and being shut down not by punishment, not by isolation, but by sudden and overwhelming reward reward reward; and the knowing: you would do anything, anything, anything, anything; _please_ don't go, don't go.

* * *

_awful disgusting unworthy_

"It's stupid, really," you say.

Your interrogator makes that little "go on" noise and you lean on them.

"Please stay. _Please_."  
  
Your interrogator shifts their weight away and you grasp at the fabric of their jeans, desperately stealing a little more touch; but you obey the unspoken command and curl into yourself, independent. They stand. It has been a long time since you have stood.

"Why?" Their tone gives away nothing.

I don't know, you say. It's a safe first answer in this case, you think. You don't know what the second answer should be, but you're prepared to wait until you have a clue. You choke down another _please_. You have strained their patience enough.

Surely you know you don't deserve it. They're smiling now. You know that smile. You flinch despite yourself.

I know, you say. That's the safe thing to say. Echo the verb. Try to hold still.

Pathetic, they say. You flinch again at the word. You feel raw and exposed like you haven't in... a while. Another tender place they found in you.

Their hand again, in your hair. Your body droops. You do not allow yourself to fall out of your assigned position, but somehow you settle yourself closer to the ground anyway.

Ungrateful brat, the words hitting like slaps. But their hand is so gentle, so terribly wonderfully gentle. You squeeze your eyes shut and try to breathe quietly. You don't want this to end. You don't want them to change their mind. You are so afraid that they will change their mind.

And yet, they say, mulling over the words, and your heart leaps, not totally hopeless.

* * *

Thank you, you say, the words tumbling out of you, unrestrained. Thank you for giving me meaning.

"You want me to give you meaning?"

"Please." That's usually a safe response. Usually passive enough. But just in case, you tuck your head in a little more. You aren't inviting the touch. You aren't insolently demanding it. The touch is. It is. It _is_.  
  
It's up to them.

"Are you hiding from me," they say.

"No," you say.

"Stop," they say.

Cautiously, not opening your eyes but focusing everything you are on the timbre of their hand, you uncurl.

Further, they say, not letting up on the steady pressure, moving with you. You sprawl yourself out on the uneven stone. It's cold. You're shaking. Their hand is on your neck now and you can feel their pulse. Your pulse? You can feel a pulse where your bodies meet, warm and strong. Your eyes sting with the threat of tears. Perhaps your hearts are beating together.

That's right, they say, and take away their hand. That's right.

The words feel almost like being touched.

Stay there. I'll be back for you.

You stay.


End file.
